The 20th ''Literature/{{Discworld}}'' novel and the 4th in the Death theme, now becoming more like the Death-Susan theme. Was also the first book to be adapted by Sky One for a live action TV movie.

Susan, Death's granddaughter, is trying distance herself from her supernatural side by being normal (which is abnormal for the Discworld) and taking the position of governess in the Gaiter household, where she tries to instill some rationality into her young charges. Meanwhile, the Auditors' latest plan is to hire the Assassins' Guild to kill the Hogfather, the Discworld's Santa Claus analog. The task is given to Mr. Teatime, a creative but overly zealous young assassin, who has already hypothesized how to kill many [[AnthropomorphicPersonification anthropomorphic personifications]] in his spare time.

With the Hogfather out of the way, there seem to be a whole lot more minor gods and goddesses around than there used to be - and perhaps the disappearance of a tooth fairy might shed some light on the whole ordeal?

Preceded by ''Discworld/FeetOfClay'', followed by ''Discworld/{{Jingo}}''. Preceded in the Death series by ''Discworld/SoulMusic.'' Sort-of followed by ''Discworld/ThiefOfTime'', where Death and Susan do everything relevant that ''isn't'' done by Lu Tze or Lobsang.----!!The book contains examples of:

* AbsurdlySharpBlade: Death's scythe and sword.* AdultFear: The entire reason the [[spoiler:Boogeyman, the living embodiment of the "monster under the bed" type scare, became the Tooth Fairy]] was to protect children from real monsters like [[PsychopathicManchild Teatime]].* AnAesop: Several of the traditional sappy Christmas Aesops are mercilessly mocked.** Death delivers a straight Aesop [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AnaQXJmpwM4 near the end]].---> '''Death''': [[/folder]]

[[folder: You need to believe in things that aren't true. How else can they ''become''? ]]

* AnalogyBackfire: Mr. Teatime's claim to be a security-guard's "worst nightmare" falls flat, because the guard's ''actual'' nightmares are a lot more bizarre than Teatime's threats.--> '''Teatime:''' I'm the one where a man comes out of nowhere and kills you stone dead.--> '''Guard''' ''(with relief):'' Oh, ''that'' one! That one's not so ba-* AffablyEvil: Mr. Teatime, in a way.* AllMythsAreTrue: As is traditional for Discworld, a large number of Christmas myths and stories are all happening at the same time.* AlternativeCharacterInterpretation: Applied in-universe to "Good" King Wenceslas.* AmbiguousInnocence: A big theme in the book is that children's stories are hardly as sweet as some imagine.* TheArtifact: Susan is the Duchess of Sto Helit, which she inherited from her father Mort, who himself was given the job at the end of ''Discworld/{{Mort}}''. This makes her choice of occupation somewhat... unusual. Given the way her status is very briefly {{Handwaved}} it seems clear that this {{Backstory}} is pretty inconvenient to Terry and the direction he wanted to take the character of Susan in, which is presumably why it is mostly ignored later.* BadassBookworm: Susan.* BadassSanta: Like our Santa, the Hogfather is derived from old pagan gods... just a little more literally. And then Death takes over for him. ''You'd better watch out...''--> [[/folder]]

[[folder: Have you been naughty... or nice? ]]

* BadSanta: Death is bad at being Santa. In a good way.* BatmanGambit: Death forbidding Susan from getting involved, knowing full well that she would disobey him.* BeCarefulWhatYouWishFor: Susan starts the book very annoyed by the power set that comes with being related to Death, and is aggressively attempting to be normal. Then she gets to the Tooth Fairy's country, where she ''is'' normal because Death doesn't exist there--and Teatime's goons get the drop on her because her powers aren't working.* BegoneBribe: Foul Ol' Ron and his fellow tramps tell a restaurant owner that they'll sing (badly) for free, since it's Hogswatch. He takes the hint and gives them some food to make them go away.* BerserkButton:** Death, to the Auditors' hypocritical argument at the end:--> One said, You cannot do this, there are rules!--> [[/folder]]

[[folder: Yes. There are rules. But you broke them. How dare you? ''[[Beware The Nice Ones how dare you? ]]'']]** "Our mam ''said'' [[WouldntHitAGirl don't hit girls...]]"** Averted as regards the pronunciation of Mr. Teatime's name (see ItIsPronouncedTroPAY below) - after he has repeatedly complained about this throughout the book, Susan tries to use it to put him off balance, but it doesn't work as he is merely mildly irritated by it.* BewareTheNiceOnes: [[/folder]]

[[folder: Death ]]. Sure, he's [[/folder]]

[[folder: Death ]] and all, but this book shows that he cares a hell of a lot about the world, so ''don't'' mess with reality and piss him off. See BerserkButton above.* TheBladeAlwaysLandsPointyEndIn: Done with a crowbar for extra absurdity.* BluebirdOfHappiness: Is actually a blue chicken.* BookEnds: One of the earliest scenes is Death on the ocean floor overseeing the death of a deep-sea organism that looks like a brilliant red flower when an apparently random rockfall kills it. Towards the end, he uses it as an example of the Auditors' antipathy to life to Susan:--> '''Death''': [[/folder]]

[[folder: Down in the deepest kingdoms of the sea, where there is no light, there lives a type of creature with no brain and no eyes and no mouth. It does nothing but live and put forth petals of perfect crimson where none are there to see. It is nothing but a tiny ]] ''[[/folder]]

[[folder: yes ]]'' [[/folder]]

[[folder: in the night. And yet... And yet... It has enemies who bear it a vicious, unbending malice, who wish not only for its tiny life to be over but also that it had never existed. Are you with me so far? ]]

--> '''Susan''': Well, yes, but ---> '''Death''': [[/folder]]

[[folder: Good. Now, ]] ''[[/folder]]

[[folder: imagine what they think of humanity. ]]''** This is noted by Susan as significant in-universe because of how rarely Death speaks so emphatically ([[PaintingTheMedium in italics]]).* {{Bowdlerize}}: Mrs. Huggs, leader of the wassailers, revised traditional Hogswatch songs to eliminate "unwarranted coarseness", even in cases (like "The Red Rosy Hen") when it doesn't actually exist.* BrainsAndBrawn: The Lilywhite brothers; Banjo is the brawn, Medium Dave is the brains.* BrickJoke: After accidentally summoning yet another would-be anthropomorphic personification, Ridcully wonders aloud where the ''glingleglingleglingle'' noise that accompanies each manifestation is coming from. Near the end of the book, he encounters the Glingle-Glingle-Glingle Fairy.* BroughtDownToNormal: Susan finds she can't do any of Death's tricks in the Tooth Fairy's realm. Luckily for her, [[spoiler:neither can Death's sword]].* CallBack: The Hogfather and the Tooth Fairy were both introduced as concepts in earlier books. Rincewind and Twoflower were seen wondering what the Tooth Fairy did with all those teeth back in ''Discworld/TheLightFantastic''.* ChekhovsGun: At the beginning of the book Ridcully makes an off-the-cuff remark:--> '''Ridcully''': [[spoiler:Get hold of something like someone's nail clipping and you've get 'em under your control. That's real old magic. Dawn of time stuff.]]** There's also Twyla's "[[spoiler:It only kills monsters]]," near the beginning.* ChildrenAreInnocent: Analyzes [[AmbiguousInnocence the dark side]] of this trope.* ChristmasCarolers: The Hogswatch Wassailers are a YouMeanXmas version of the trope. The LemonyNarrator says that if you could lift the scene up, there'd be an interesting assortment of chocolates or biscuits underneath.** And then there's the Canting Crew, who sing--or at least make vaguely festive noises--at people until they give them some money or food to go away.* ClapYourHandsIfYouBelieve: Along with ''Discworld/SmallGods'', the book in which the concept is most examined.* ContinuityNod: Ridcully mentions the time the build up of life force happened in Discworld/ReaperMan.** Death says his taking care of humanity has something to do with the harvest, a thing he realizes in Discworld/ReaperMan.*** The fields of wheat that Death turns part of his garden into to remind himself of this are described briefly** The Glingleglingleglingle Fairy offers to play "The Bells of St. Ungulant's" for Ridcully. Brutha encountered St. Ungulant in ''Small Gods''* CrappyHolidays: In one scene, the wizards are briefly sent into a funk where they ruminate on all the things they hate about the holidays.* CrazyCatLady: Susan worries that Death is going senile and becoming one of these. He's really more of a KindHeartedCatLover, though.* CrazyPrepared: Teatime, to the point where when he's given an assignment to kill the Hogfather, he tells Downey that he'd already come up with a plan years ago when he was a kid, as a thought experiment, in addition to beings like the Tooth Fairy, the Soul Cake Duck, and ''Death himself''.* CueTheSun* CurbStompBattle: This is, of course, the only possible outcome when you piss off ''TheGrimReaper'' himself. [[spoiler: The book does not actually ''describe'' what happens, exactly. All we know is that he was up against an army of Auditors... and then he [[CriticalExistenceFailure wasn't]].]]* CurseCutShort: The Duck Man clamp a hand over Foul Ole Ron's mouth in time to stop him dropping an F-bomb while wassailing.* DarkIsNotEvil: Besides [[/folder]]

[[folder: the man himself ]], it turns out [[spoiler:the real Tooth Fairy is also the MonsterProgenitor of the bogeymen... but took up collecting teeth to protect children from malicious magic.]]* {{Deconstruction}}:** Of a lot of children's literature; Susan notes the SociopathicHero nature of Jack and other fairy tale protagonists[[note]]a recurring element in the series[[/note]], but the book is even harsher towards [[{{Disneyfication}} very]] [[{{Glurge}} saccharine]] [[SickeninglySweet works]], which are made to appeal to adults rather than children. Death, meanwhile, does this for various [[ChristmasTropes Hogswatch Tropes]].** The speech Death gives about [[spoiler: humans needing fantasy to be human]] is a deconstruction of the famous "Yes, Virginia, There Is A Santa Claus" editorial from the Sun (which was ''mercilessly'' mocked in an earlier Susan monologue).* DeliberatelyCuteChild: Susan tells off one of her charges for trying this:--> '''Twyla:''' I'm afwaid of the monster in the cellar, Thusan. It's going to eat me up.\\'''Susan:''' What have I told you about trying to sound ingratiatingly cute, Twyla?\\'''Twyla:''' You said I mustn't. You said that [[ElmerFuddSyndrome exaggerated lisping]] is a hanging offence and I only do it to get attention.* DidntSeeThatComing: Teatime probably would have done just fine if he hadn't underestimated [[spoiler:how much Banjo got upset about hitting girls.]]* DisneyVillainDeath: Subverted twice: first, [[spoiler:Susan actually has to kick Teatime before he falls, then he survives the fall and gets ImpaledWithExtremePrejudice]].* DontExplainTheJoke: [[/folder]]

[[folder: I don't know if you noticed, Albert, but that was a pune, or play on words. ]]

* DontFearTheReaper: There is a debate between Teatime and Susan as to the ''good taste'' of the Sto Helit family motto ''Non Timetus Messor''. The "death is not to be feared" theme of this trope is evident in the nature and character of the Discworld Death.* DontTouchItYouIdiot: Ridcully finds a bathroom that has been boarded up, had a sign put up warning not to open the room, and the door hidden behind a bookcase. So, of course, he opens it up to see why it was closed up. ** A recurring theme of the book, and indeed every appearance of the wizards, is that if anything appears to be DontTouchItYouIdiot, a wizard can be relied upon to be the Idiot who Touches It. There's also Ridcully's investigation of how the organ is linked to the plumbing.** At the end of the book the mysterious bathroom is sealed up again and numerous "Do NOT enter for any reason!!" signs put up. The dwarf doing it leaves the nails ''slightly'' loose [[HereWeGoAgain because he knows wizards,]] and doesn't want to make it too hard to pull them back out again next time they want to have a look.* DoubleJump: Teatime, amazingly enough.* DumbassHasAPoint: The Bursar suggests willow bark as a hangover cure. Willow bark contains salicin, from which aspirin was discovered.* DwindlingParty: The group of criminals Teatime brings along gets picked off one by one.* EarTrumpet: Windle Poons' old trumpet shows up again as a way to give Hex commands.* EatingShoes: The meal of mud and old boots. See SupremeChef below.* EldritchLocation: Tooth Fairy's Castle.* EnemiesWithDeath: Teatime is a particularly odd case of Enemies with Death as he's the one who decided to be. Death is only one of the anthropomorphic personifications he plans how to kill, but Death himself doesn't view Teatime (or almost any human) as an enemy and the primary battle is between Teatime and Susan.* EvenBadMenLoveTheirMamas: [[spoiler:It's more awe and fear than love, but when Teatime insults the late Ma Lilywhite, that's apparently the last straw for Medium Dave. For the record, he ''immediately'' draws his sword and snarls, "What did you say about our mum?" the ''instant'' Teatime implies disrespect towards Ma Lilywhite, and all the while knowing full-well how dangerous Teatime is.]]* EvenEvilHasStandards:** The amoral Lord Downey is creeped out by how Teatime is dangerously unhinged, while nominally following the rules of the Assassin's Guild.--->Like many people with no actual morals, Lord Downey ''did'' have standards, and Teatime repelled him.*** One of the reasons why Teatime gives even other assassins the willies is that as a rule, an assassin is supposed to keep collateral damage to an absolute minimum and to cause as little physical damage to their "client" as they can. Teatime, however, prefers creating as much of a bloodbath as possible and leave his victims mutilated and/or dismembered. Guards, servants, not even pets are safe. A good assassin takes pride in a clean kill, but Teatime takes delight in a messy one. ** Medium Dave and the other lowlifes also have their own twisted code of conduct, and ''they're'' unsettled by Teatime's [[YouHaveOutlivedYourUsefulNess mindless ruthlessness]].* EverythingFades: People who die in the Tooth Fairy's castle get teleported away. This is because the place is based on the imagination of children, who do not really grasp the concept of death or what happens after you die. [[spoiler:Which is why Death needed Susan to go there for him -- the Tooth Fairy's land is [[/folder]]

[[folder: A place I cannot go ]]]].** As well as sustaining the being itself, Discworld belief allows for things associated with that being that couldn't physically exist to do so. For example, the Castle of Bones where the Hogfather lives is architecturally implausible at best but can exist because of belief in the Hogfather. When belief in the Hogfather drains away, entropy takes over and the Castle eventually collapses under its own weight. * ExactWords: Teatime's reassuring comment "Don't worry, a violent death is the last thing that'll happen to you".* ExpensiveGlassOfCrap: In a footnote, it's mentioned that some aristocrats operate under the delusion that labeling the types of expensive alcohol in their bottles backwards will fool servants into not drinking it. It dryly notes that the servants are rarely fooled, and assume with rather more justification that their masters won't notice if the bottles are then topped up with "eniru".* FromDressToDressing: Susan does this to patch up the Hogfather's wounds after saving him from the Auditors. * FullBoarAction: Rooter, Gouger, Tusker and Snouter. Also the pre-human form of the Hogfather himself.* FunWithAcronyms: Various items attached to Hex are {{Stealth Pun}}s relating to computer acronyms, such as fluffy teddy bear = FTB = FTP.* GeniusDitz: Violet. The temp Tooth Fairy quickly takes the measure of Teatime's gang, and tells Susan about them right away -- but she needs to shut down all other brain functions to remember the order of the alphabet.* GentleGiant: Banjo, when he's ''not'' being ordered around by a charismatic psychopath.* GiftOfTheMagiPlot: Subverted when the Dean gives the Bursar a box for his dried frog pills. The Bursar, naturally, no longer has any to put in it... because the Dean swiped them from his room, rather than shell out any more money for a ''full'' pillbox.* GodsNeedPrayerBadly: The existence of anthropomorphic personifications is somewhere between this and ClapYourHandsIfYouBelieve.* HearMeTheMoney: The Auditors of Reality leave a rather unusual payment when they commission the Assassin's Guild to off the eponymous holiday figure: blank discs of pure gold. The head of the guild bounces one on his desk, and the sound and bounce of the "coin" confirm its composition for him.* HideousHangoverCure: Whipped up for Bilious by the wizards, who mix together every single hangover cure they can think of. And since Bilious gets all of the hangovers from Bibulous, the god of wine, [[spoiler:''[[LaserGuidedKarma Bibulous gets all of the]] [[HilarityEnsues effects of the hangover cure]].'']]* [[ChristmasEpisode Hogswatch Episode]]* [[ChristmasMiracle Hogswatch Miracle]]: Numerous, including Death preventing a [[DiedHappilyEverAfter Little Matchstick Girl]] in progress.--> '''Death''': [[/folder]]

[[folder: The Hogfather can. The Hogfather gives presents. There's no better present than [[Crowning Moment Of Heartwarming a future. ]]]]* HoistByHisOwnPetard: Teatime. Part of the brilliance of his plan was that Death could do nothing directly to stop him because Death cannot go to the Tooth Fairy's country -- because it is based on the imagination of children, who have no fully formed concept of death. Later when Susan confronts him there, he takes Death's sword from her and attempts to slay her with it, only to find [[spoiler:the blade cannot exist there either, as there is no death]].* HowCanSantaDeliverAllThoseToys: When questions of this type start cropping up it's a sign that belief in the Hogfather is waning. ** The answer to how he normally does it is that things such as linear time and being physically larger than a house's flue are rules that are suspended on a temporary basis by the power of belief in order to allow it. The fact that the whole event occurs in a sort of non-time allows Albert to make a return to the world in spite of only having a few seconds left to live. * HumanityIsInfectious: While more fully explored in ''Discworld/ThiefOfTime'' it's glimpsed at here when [[spoiler:the Auditors become addicted to living when they take on the form of wolves to pursue the Hogfather.]]** It's a long running concept in all the Discworld books that Death has changed quite a bit from hanging around humanity for all these eons. He keeps trying, with "[[HilarityEnsues interesting]]" results, to understand humans. He started out "just doing his job" but has come to care about humans quite a bit.* HumansAreTheRealMonsters: Subverted. It's not ''humans'', it's just ''Teatime''. The kids themselves point out that a skeleton isn't really frightening when it's holding a biscuit and a teacup, and Teatime's effort to win them over falls totally flat.--> '''Death:''' [[/folder]]

[[folder: The world will teach them about monsters soon enough. ]]

--> '''Susan:''' But... he was a man.--> '''Death:''' [[/folder]]

[[folder: I think [[Wise Beyond Their Years they ]] know quite well what he was.]]* IJustWantToBeNormal: Susan spends most of the book thinking this way.* ImpaledWithExtremePrejudice: [[spoiler:Teatime, with a poker. It only kills ''monsters''. Hence, it ignores Death (who was standing in the way).]]* ImYourWorstNightmare: Parodied.* ItIsPronouncedTroPAY: Teatime is {{insistent|Terminology}} that his name is pronounced "Teh-ah-tim-eh" (or "Teh-ah-tar-mee" in the TV adaptation).* KidsAreCruel: A major theme of the book.* KnifeNut: Teatime.* LeavingFoodForSanta: On the Discworld, children leave out a pork pie and a glass of sherry for the Hogfather, and a turnip for the hogs that pull his sleigh. Death can't eat or drink, so Albert deals with the pies and sherry for him (particularly enthusiastically when it comes to the sherry).* MagicalNanny: Susan's occupation during the novel. Of course, this being Susan, she's ''much'' more BadAss than the average MagicalNanny.* {{Magitek}} and MagicalComputer: Hex.* [[MallSanta Mall Hogfather]]: Death's rather... ''special'' stint as one is one of his tricks to regain faith in the Hogfather.* TheManBehindTheCurtain: [[spoiler:The Tooth Fairy.]]* TheManBehindTheMan: The Auditors are the... uh... ''entities'' behind Teatime's Hogfather-assassination contract.* MeaningfulName: In Scots, to banjo someone means to knock them down or assault them. * MetaphorIsMyMiddleName:-->'''Death''': [[/folder]]

[[folder: If I had a first name, 'Duty' would be my middle name. ]]

* MetaphoricallyTrue: Susan refuses to believe that the sun wouldn't have come up if they had failed to restore the Hogfather. Death insists that it would not have:--> '''Death:''' [[/folder]]

[[folder: A mere ball of glowing gas would have illuminated the world ]].** He then goes on to explain why this is, in fact, an important distinction.* MismatchedEyes: Teatime has one glass eye and one ''really'' creepy non-glass eye. In the book it's nearly white; in the movie it's [[CreepyBlueEyes pale blue]].* MisplacedKindergartenTeacher: The Cheerful Fairy resembles one.* MisunderstoodLonerWithAHeartOfGold: The Tooth Fairy/[[spoiler:Bogey Man]].* MotivationalLie: Teatime tries to get Banjo to attack Susan by telling him that Susan hurt the Tooth Fairy.** Death telling Susan that the sun won't come up if the Hogfather dies can be seen as this or a HalfTruth mixed with a very careful use of ExactWords.* [[KickTheDog Nail The Dog To The Ceiling]]: Teatime, of course.* NiceJobBreakingItHero: The Tooth Fairy's intention in gathering all the teeth was [[spoiler: to protect them from use in SympatheticMagic. Instead, it makes it all the easier for Teatime and his gang to get them.]]* NobleDemon: The Tooth Fairy/[[spoiler:Bogey Man]].* NoKillLikeOverkill: Teatime's AxCrazy nature is revealed from the description of him doing this in the course of an assassination. He did everything by the book, including using a mirror to check the whether the inhumed was breathing. That the victim's head was, at this time, several feet away from his body apparently did not enter into Teatime's mind as relevant. Or excessive.* NoodleIncident: ** The exact side-effects of the hangover cure. Sadly, that scene did not make it into the movie.** The incident which prompted Ridcully to close down the forbidden bathroom at the end of the book. It appears to have involved the 'afterburner' on the organ. Precisely why the organ needed an afterburner, given that this is normally the component of a jet engine, is a noodle incident in itself.** The full extent of the gory details of Teatime's assassination of Sir George are not revealed, but given that we do learn that Sir George himself was [[LosingYourHead decapitated]] and that the family dog was nailed to the ceiling, that's probably for the best. * NoOneCouldSurviveThat: [[spoiler:Mr Teatime's [[DisneyVillainDeath fall from the top of the tower]]. He even disappeared afterward, like the other corpses. Because he was dead, and foolishly resuscitated by the wizards.]]* NotWhatISignedOnFor: One [[{{Mook}} henchman's]] response when he finds out Teatime plans to kill the Hogfather.* NowILayMeDownToSleep: Susan mentions this as one of the reasons she hates the previous nanny of the kids she looks after.* OddJobGods: Bilious, the Oh God of Hangovers becomes one by the end.** The Hogfather himself could qualify. He started out as a pagan blood sacrifice, and is now tasked with delivering presents to children. "Industrial retraining", as Quoth puts it. * OnlySaneMan: Medium Dave is inexplicably the only one of the thieves who doesn't become childlike under the Tooth Fairy's influence (Banjo also didn't ''become'' childlike, but unlike Medium Dave that has the explanation that Banjo already was a child at heart before they entered the place). [[spoiler: Until the phantom of his mother appears.]]* PigMan: The Hogfather himself has elements of this.* PostClimaxConfrontation: Two. One against [[spoiler: the Auditors]] and one against [[spoiler: a NotQuiteDead Teatime]].* PreAsskickingOneLiner: [[/folder]]

[[folder: Now there remains one final question. Have you been naughty... or nice? Ho. Ho. Ho. ]]

** Susan gets one too: "Hi, inner child. I'm the inner babysitter."* PsychoForHire: Teatime, of course.* PsychopathicManchild: Banjo and, in a different way, Teatime. Teatime is mostly psychopath, while Banjo is mostly man-child.* RealDreamsAreWeirder: The Tooth Fairy's guards take Teatime's declaration of "I'm your worst nightmare!" ''entirely'' too literally.* ReligiousRobot: Hex is told to believe in the Hogfather. He does so.* ResetButton: Near the beginning, Ponder successfully cures the Bursar of his insanity by having him talk with Hex (though at the cost of temporarily driving Hex mad in turn). At the end, the Bursar goes mad again after Mr Teatime materialises on top of the dinner table and a wild swipe of Death's sword slices through the fork in the Bursar's hand.** This is also a form of BookEnds, as the Bursar originally went mad because of a different 'unfortunate incident at dinner': Windle Poons shambling into the Great Hall as a zombie in ''Discworld/ReaperMan''.* RetroactiveWish: When the wizards work out that the various minor fairies are spontaneously forming when people mention their function, the Dean quickly jumps in with "What, like the 'Give the Dean a Huge Bag of Money Goblin'?" It doesn't work because wishful thinking is a far cry from belief. * ReversePsychology: It would be against the rules for Death to involve a human in the matter. This is why he specifically told her not to get involved.* RuleOfCool: Death comments that he added the sparks and the glow when [[spoiler:the poker goes through him harmlessly]] because he felt it was 'appropriate'.* [[SavingChristmas Saving Hogswatch]]* ScholarshipStudent: Teatime is one of several mentioned in the series who are these for the Assassin's Guild.* SelfMadeOrphan: Teatime provides the page quote.--> '''Lord Downey:''' We took pity on him because he lost both parents at an early age. I think, on reflection, we should have wondered a bit more about that.* ShootTheDangerousMinion: Downey seriously considers having Teatime killed for a) violating Guild standards and b) being good enough to sneak into Downey's own office unnoticed. * ShoutOut:** The wardrobe from one of the thugs' bad childhood memories swallows them up -- Violet and Bilious discuss the fact that wardrobes [[{{Narnia}} have been known to transport people to magical lands]], but his destination is unlikely to be pleasant.** A wizard runs a thaumometer (a [[Franchise/StarTrek glass cube]]) over a dead body.** A ''double'' ShoutOut: one footnote discusses a [[{{Bowdlerize}} bowdlerization]] of a folk song "The red rosy hen greets the dawn of the day" (the implication being that it was originally "cock" rather than "hen") and concludes that "Sometimes a chicken is nothing but a bird." This refers both to an [[BeamMeUpScotty apocryphal quotation attributed to Sigmund Freud]] "Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar", and to a [[http://www.answers.com/topic/a-chicken-ain-t-nothin-but-a-bird-performed-by-cab-calloway jazz song by Emett "Babe" Wallace]] titled "A Chicken Ain't Nothing but a Bird". ''Not'' to be confused with Ivor Biggun's ''Has Anybody Seen My Cock''.** Susan swore to beat herself to death with her own umbrella if she caught herself [[Film/MaryPoppins dancing on rooftops with the chimneysweeps.]]*** Amusingly, as a nanny, Susan is a lot more like the [[GoodIsNotNice Mary Poppins character]] in [[Literature/MaryPoppins the original books]].** When Teatime falls onto the table in the Unseen University, one of the wizards comments with something along the lines of, [[Film/MontyPythonsTheMeaningOfLife "But I didn't even eat any of that salmon mousse." ]]** Another Python reference: When Susan drags the unconscious and extremely ill Bilious to Unseen University and explains that "He's not dead, he's just resting."** There's this exchange, between Death and Albert: "[[/folder]]

[[folder: It is Hogswatch, and people die on the streets. People feast behind lighted windows and other people have no homes. Is this fair? ]]" "Well, of course, that’s the big issue—". [[http://www.bigissue.org.uk/ The Big Issue]] is a UK homelessness charity. This may also be a nod to Sydney Carter's AntiChristmasSong "Standing in the Rain".* SkipOfInnocence: Twyla and her brother Gawain do this as part of their DeliberatelyCuteChild personae. Susan isn't fooled, saying "real children don't go hoppity-skippity unless they're on drugs".* StableTimeLoop: [[spoiler:The toy horse Albert wanted when he was a child that was bought by someone else was [[/folder]]

[[folder: Death ]] going back in time and buying it for him. D'awwww.]]* SubbingForSanta: Death is a very creepy stand-in for the Hogfather. He does a pretty good job, though, considering what he had to work with.--> '''Death''' ''(to an undercover Nobby Nobbs):'' [[/folder]]

[[folder: And have you been a good bo... a good dwa... a good gno... a good individual? ]]

* SupremeChef: The manager of the restaurant in Ankh-Morpork, a former chef, is able to make meals out of mud and old boots (after Death steals his food stocks to feed the beggars) by a combination of skill and 'headology' (people will eat anything in a fancy restaurant if the menu is in French... Er, Quirmian). In ''Nanny Ogg's Cookbook'' it's noted that mud and old boots-based cuisine eventually caught on across the city's posh restaurants.* TakeThat: Has a ''very'' vicious one towards Creator/HansChristianAndersen's "Literature/TheLittleMatchGirl".** Also thoroughly deconstructs the story of Good King Wenceslas. Admittedly, the King was more of jerkass than actually evil, but the point still stands; spontaneous charity on one day does not make up for neglect in the rest of the year, and also that forcing (inappropriate) charity on people who don't want it just to make ''yourself'' feel better is just as bad.** He names, explains, and then thoroughly takes apart the [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anthropic_principle Anthropic Principle]]. Twice. In a single footnote.* TemptingFate:** At the very beginning, Ridcully is opening a door with a [[SchmuckBait sign]] that says, "Do not, under any circumstances, open this door." Why? "To see why they wanted it shut, of course." [[FootnoteFever A footnote]] lets us know that this tells us just about all we need to know about human civilization. At least, the parts of it that are either underwater, fenced off, or still smoking.** At the end, when Ridcully shuts the room up again, the caretaker doesn't hammer the nails in too hard, so they'll come out easy next time.** Wizards being wizards, when someone realizes that magical beings are popping into existence when people think of them, the Faculty start saying that "Just because you think of {insert critter here} doesn't make it appear!" Cue appearance of the Eater of Socks.* TongueOnTheFlagpole: While not using the tongue, this trope is mentioned. Albert reminisces about a toy horse he wanted as a kid. "I must have spent hours staring at it with my nose pressed against the glass, until someone heard my cries and unfroze me."* TooDumbToLive: A quite literal application of the trope: [[spoiler:The Auditors. They pushed [[/folder]]

[[folder: Death's ]] BerserkButton. ''While they were in mortal form''.]]* [[TrueMeaningOfChristmas True Meaning Of Hogswatch]]: Parodied, of course. Death resolves to teach people the real meaning of Hogswatch. Albert then lists the more unpleasant (i.e. sacrificial pigs and loads of blood) aspects of pagan winter festivals until Death decides to teach people the ''un''real meaning of Hogswatch.* UrbanLegends: The source of some of the sprites coming into existence from the Hogfather's belief.* VillainousDemotivator: Teatime's not very good at making friends.* WhatHappenedToTheMouse: Early on, Susan goes to Death's house and finds the room in which the lifetimers of the gods and anthropomorphic personifications are stored, finding the Hogfather's smashed on the floor: her line "Grandfather, what have you done?" seems to suggest she mistakenly thinks the Hogfather is dead due to an accident by Death. Why the lifetimer is smashed, and Susan's mistaken impression, are never revisited.** It's implied elsewhere in the Discworld books that a person's life and their life-timer are literally connected by some sort of symbiosis. Thus, by killing the Hogfather before his time, one also destroys his life-timer.* WhoNamesTheirKidDude: Susan notes Gawain and Twyla as this.* [[WorldOfPun World Of Pune]]: Hex has a lot of computer puns, [[StealthPun stealth]] and otherwise -- sheep skulls (RAM), small religious pictures (icons), an 'Anthill Inside' sticker (Intel Inside), a mouse and so on. It is said that he's basically building himself off the ideas of computers from Earth.* WouldHitAGirl: Teatime* WouldntHitAGirl: [[spoiler:Banjo Lilywhite.]]* YesVirginia: Parodied ruthlessly.* YouHaveOutlivedYourUsefulness: Everyone Teatime ever meets. It is curiously binary; if you are not helping him anymore, you are effectively dead. The only thing you can do is run out the clock. [[spoiler:Mr. Brown]] is GenreSavvy enough to defy this, but [[spoiler:Banjo]] kills him anyway. Teatime lets [[spoiler:Sidney]] go because he was distracted, but [[spoiler:the poor wizard still doesn't get out of the Tooth Fairy World alive.]]* YouMeanXmas: Hogswatchnight.* YourWorstNightmare:** [[spoiler:The [[PrimalFear Tooth Fairy's]] last line of defense. Doesn't really work on Susan; she ''likes'' snakes. Teatime also overcame it, although he didn't care to explain how beyond "I am in touch with my inner child."]]*** The live-action adaptation had [[spoiler: his soul literally be that of a young version of him. He was in touch with his inner child [[FridgeBrilliance because he's basically the same person]] as he was when he ''was'' a child.]] It's the same reason why [[spoiler: Banjo wasn't targeted by the Tooth Fairy's defenses, but his brother was: he was, at heart, a child, and the Tooth Fairy had built his castle explicitly so he could protect children.]]** The worst nightmares of the one guard that Teatime killed were rather strange, involving some sort of giant cabbage with something resembling combine blades mounted on it. But then again, when did a person's worst nightmare have to make sense to anyone else?

----!!The TV adaptation contains examples of:

* AdaptationalAttractiveness: Nobby Nobbs. Mind you, making him look ''anything'' like described in the books would require heavy-duty CGI, enough makeup to cover the actor, a full-body suit, or hiring a chimpanzee and dubbing in his lines. This somewhat ruins the joke in which Death is unable to discern Nobby's species, eventually calling him an "individual", because he's pretty clearly human onscreen.* AdaptationDistillation: The adaptation shows all the events as they happen chronologically, even those that Susan (and through her, the readers) does not learn about until almost the very end of the book (most notable are [[spoiler: the relation between the Tooth Fairy's realm and children's drawings, how death is treated in the Tooth Fairy's realm, the outright spelling-out of Teatime's plan for the teeth starting with punching Banjo, and the no-longer-behind-the-scenes nature of Death's decision to impersonate the Hogfather]]).--> '''Death''':[[/folder]]

[[folder: [[Magnificent Bastard You might think I hadn't thought of that, but I couldn't possibly comment. ]]]]* BehindTheBlack: Teatime takes OffscreenTeleportation to the max, with one cut having characters ''looking right at him'' and then the next having him coming completely out of nowhere to push Medium Dave against a wall. In the final scene too. How the hell did he get behind Death?** FlashStep.* CarpetRolledCorpse: Kidnapped Violet is transported this way by Teatime's hired thugs.* CoconutSuperpowers: The Scissor Man never appearing on screen is a big one, as are the quick cuts away while magic is being performed.* CompositeCharacter: The Wizard character was given Peachy the thief's fear for the movie, and Catseye's fear was likewise ascribed to Mr. Brown, albeit without its backstory.* ContinuityNod: The back of the Dean's robe reads [[Discworld/SoulMusic "Born to Rune"]].* CreatorCameo: Terry Pratchett appears as the toymaker at the very end.* DrivingADesk: Binky's flying scenes.* FamilyUnfriendlyDeath: Of deaths inside the castle, [[spoiler: Mr. Brown is thrown down a large number of stairs, Middle Dave simply fades from existence after being hit by a light projection of his mother, and a third dies apparently of fright after being pulled into a wardrobe that scared him as a child. But Sidney? TheWoobie wizard of the group with a penchant for sucking his thumb when frightened? The last we see of him is him sobbing in fear as the silhouette of the ''Scissor Man'' is cutting closer and closer to his head. And he had been lucky enough before to 'outlive his usefulness' minutes earlier and Teatime actually let him leave without trying to kill him.]]* FunnyBackgroundEvent: During the final confrontation, while [[spoiler:Teatime is threatening Susan with Death's sword]], Death is awkwardly holding a cookie he'd picked up and hadn't gotten to eat. He even glances down at it a couple times, as if he's wondering if he could get away with eating it when nobody's looking.* HellIsThatNoise: [[invoked]]The sound of the Scissor Man.* InformedAttribute: Despite Nobby Nobbs' AdaptationalAttractiveness, Death still acts like he can't tell what species he belongs to.* InstantSoprano: Ridcully's off-screen encounter with the "Old Faithful" setting in Bloody Stupid Johnson's bathtub has him talking like this.* NothingIsScarier: We never actually see the Scissor Man, but we do get treated to a shadow moments before [[spoiler: it killed Sidney in a nightmarishly FamilyUnfriendlyDeath]].* NotWhatItLooksLike: Uttered by the kid's father when the kids catch him pretending to be the Hogfather.* OffscreenTeleportation: Mr. Teatime does this all the time.* PragmaticAdaptation: All scenes with The Librarian are absent from the film, presumably because it's a lot easier to write about orangutans playing pipe organs than it is [[NeverWorkWithChildrenOrAnimals trying to film it]]. The same probably applies to the fact that the Tooth Fairy's castle was supposed to have no shadows (and, as mentioned above, Nobby's AdaptationalAttractiveness).* PsychoStrings: Used as a {{leitmotif}} for Teatime.* RunningGag: Albert never getting to smoke a cigarette.* ShoutOut: The noble music which plays when Bilious is being sobered up is of course ''[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Men_of_Harlech Men of Harlech]]'', but is [[FilkSong also known]] to some university students, current and former, as ''The [[http://www.textfiles.com/music/bard_01.txt Alcoholics']] [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=strrpmtwvl4 Anthem]]''.* SoundtrackDissonance: The sweet music playing as Teatime threatens Susan with the sword at the very end.* TakeOurWordForIt: The Scissor Man doesn't appear on screen.

----

[[/folder]]

[[folder: Now there remains one final question. Have you been naughty... or nice? Ho... Ho... Ho! ]]